Reminiscences

Sometimes, I wonder where those thoughts pop out from, but that I suppose is a matter for another time. Having just woke up, I was sitting in the living room stoning when I realised that with a little more than a month to go, the drama juniors will be working at a frantic pace towards their big night. Well. Like last year... and the year before that. To have a goal in the near future aand to be working towards it. Thinking that they have something to work towards brings back some memorable moments. I suppose that that is the difference between them and me now. Just last year, I'll have been doing the same as them, but now, work seems such a monotonous thing. There isn't a goal anymore. No big production, no rehearsals to work towards that, no planning, just work. There doesn't seem to be a point in serving people, smiling and smiling and cursing inwardly after that. That polite service smile. Day after day. Washing washing and more washing. And then what? To what purpose? I suppose you can say that the only thing I can look forward to is my pay at the end of the month. Thankfully, no one day at that place is the same. If it were, I think I might just crack. Now I see why people portray work as a dull, endless cycle that crawls snail pace everyday. To get over one day seems like such a momentous relief.

Dungeons & Dragons

There is a new Studio Ghibli film in progress. Although the film may never be released in cinemas in Singapore, I have come across a trailer for the film online. It looks promising, though knowing how they have a tendency to twist source material to their own themes and interpretation, I hope it'll still be good. A trailer does not reflect the film in it's entirety after all.

Entitled 'Gedo Senki", it is based on Ursula le Guin's Earthsea series. Those were entertaining books which were also mercifully short for something so obviously on an epic scale. Recall Lord Of the Rings, only more condensed, though the action is no less grand or vivid as Tolkein's Middle-earth. I think that if I were 12 when I read the Earthsea series, I would have been blown away by it...

In any case, the trailer certainly seems to indicate a film that deviates from the latest Miyazaki fare involving grandiose flights of fancy; of spirits, wizards, and mechanical contraptions. Of course, the Earthsea world isn't as filled with pretty elegance as Kingsbury or bureaucrats in suits, which might explain the more sparse and natural scenery. The director has also made it a point to keep the background and action simple so as to focus on the characters. Set in an archipelago setting, le Guin's Earthsea books are really a cross between LOTR and jedi lore. Sort of. As it is, being Goro Miyazaki's debut film, he has a lot to live up to, especially with a father who is already established as a master of animated films...

Needing & Wanting - a guide to Nanny McPhee

I watched this film yesterday. Heck, IF I had KNOWN earlier, we would have been watching V for Vendetta. However, Nanny McPhee wasn't so bad. Of course, being a Friday and all, Lido was packed with screaming bratty kids. You would think that Nanny Mcphee with her 5 lessons and knobbly stick would have struck terror into little bratty hearts but no... Most of them were giggling away, though I do admit that the film's appeal lay in how childish it was. Humour was mostly slapstick, punctuated with typical British dry wit.

Most of the characters were quite obviously stock types, from an overbearing aunt with hideous hat in tow, to a nasty vindictive stepmother in even more ridiculous dressing (it HAD to be the sort that revealed cleavage). As I said - these were Fairy Tales stereotypes. One must recall that the target audience of the film was children. Still, I think parents and young kids would have enjoyed it. At least, the audience at Lido were screaming with laughter.
Still, the film set was very pretty. The house where the children live in in the movie had a blue staircase. How cool is that?? A wooden country house staircase.... Walls were red and blue. Very pretty. Had the feel of children living in it - children with rather unorthodox tastes, at least it looked like a fairy tale house... very ideal for a film with typical fairy tale conventions, including a happily everafter of course.

Almost the only intriguing thing about the film is Nanny McPhee herself. Emma Thompson slips into the role of strict nanny with all apparent ease, to the extent that she seemed to have enjoyed herself immensely. A mysterious character that pops up whenever she is NEEDED, be it by the adults who run the house or the children themselves, her ending in the film is equally shrouded in ambiguity. Who is she? What IS she? I guess the answer is something we can only speculate about.

Have you been to the ACM?

It's creepy, costs only 2 bucks, and I enjoyed myself though by 1830h I was begging my aunts to get out quick! Before the place closes at 7pm. Other than tht, I enjoyed myself. It's cool to learn abt the poweer play in ancient China. The robes that officials wear actually shows their ranking. Different kinds of birds for civil officials since birds are a symbol of wisdom or something like that. It was really dim in there though, and the robes looked kinda scary, since it reminded me of the kimono room in Fatal Frame. eeee...

A New Start

It has been a week and a day since we all got our A Level results. Some of us would have jumped for joy, others feeling a little (or a lot) less bubbly. I guess we all have some idea of where we would like to go from now on. It seems like I've been living in limbo for the past few weeks till last Wednesday, worrying on the path that my future would take, everything that could happen hinging so much on that little piece of paper. Now that that is over, I can look forward to a new beginning.

Some of us will be going to NS, others working. And then what? I'll always miss my NY days. My secondary school days. Primary school, sad to say, I was too happy to leave behind. I would never have anticipated some of the paths chosen by my friends, and I am only glad that despite our irritatingly different timetables, we still keep in touch. I hope I can do the same with my jc mates. We are all walking to different tunes now. Some of course are marching to them. Heh. That was lame. Sorry. I hope that wherever we plan to go from now on, we'll still be able to keep in touch.

Doomsday

No matter what, my stupid body clock insisted that I get up at 0730h this morning. So there I was, awake in bed listening to strains of the national anthem coming from 3 different schools, the loudest which comes from the JC, since it is the nearest, and they are blasting it from the quadrangle/parade square, so even I can hear it. Seems like today of all days, my old sch wants me to wake up early. Oh, I know it's not on purpose. Usually, at 730 I'm dead to the world, and therefore don't hear anything. Funny how it is that on days that you don't ever want to wake up to, you wake up earlier and more awake than anything. Guess that's how the world works - in mysterious ways.
Or it's just a sadist who wants to torture you as long as possible so it wakes you up earlier to prolong the pain...